


Health Vocab

by aldescery



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Doctor Lafayette, Dramatic Eliza Schuyler, Drug dealer John Laurens, F/F, F/M, M/M, Maria is just a Good Friend, My First Fanfic, Nurse Theodosia Prevost Bur, Recreational Drug Use, Tired Alexander Hamilton, depending on your definition of "seriously", i can't be responsible for making you sad :(, serious topics treated not seriously so don't read this if that doesn't make you comfortable pls, sorry Hercules you just don't exist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-12
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:28:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23113963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aldescery/pseuds/aldescery
Summary: Alexander stormed down the street, clutching his coffee in righteous anger. Eliza just called him to her place at 2:00 am in the morning because she felt “sad” and similar calls had been going on all week. Despite already being awake at the time, it was still a hassle and Alex would make sure Eliza knew it before giving any comfort. Arriving at the apartment he noticed that the fridge had been left open, likely from when Eliza took out the supply of Ben and Jerry’s.“That bad?” he asked as he walked into Eliza’s room.An awful, awful crack fic where everyone is a bad person, has some disease, and on some kind of substance. Alex is a struggling caffeine addict. Eliza is an unstable buffoon. Lafayette is a failed surgeon but successful alcoholic. John is an angry man. Theodosia and Maria orbit in the background in confusion.-Basically the author:- had to do vocab-based writing assignments for their freshmen year health class- themed their works around the musical Hamilton- decided to post it on Ao3 because god is dead
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton & Elizabeth "Eliza" Schuyler, Alexander Hamilton/Gilbert du Motier Marquis de Lafayette (Past), Alexander Hamilton/John Laurens (past), Gilbert du Motier Marquis de Lafayette/Margaret "Peggy" Schuyler, Maria Reynolds & Elizabeth "Eliza" Schuyler, Maria Reynolds/Elizabeth "Eliza" Schuyler (Past), Theodosia Prevost Burr & Maria Reynolds
Kudos: 7





	1. 1 - Exercise and Nutrition / Chronic Disease

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Visemes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Visemes/gifts).



> So yeah, I had to write a "paragraph" based off of a bunch of health-related words for my freshmen health class. This is the result of that?
> 
> I also originally wrote this "story" with Alexander (I guess Alexa) as a girl, because I for some reason thought that this would get my health teacher to not realize that this was all based off of Hamilton, so be aware of that I suppose.
> 
> This story is a bit absurdist, as in it has a bunch of really serious health-stuff happen to a bunch of really bad people so I hope that you won't read it if that bothers you.
> 
> Includes: mentions of eating disorders, addiction, and illness.
> 
> Enjoy?

**Instructions**

_Welcome to Freshman Health! Every week you will be assigned a list of vocabulary. For each word on the list you will have to:_

  * _define it_
  * _write a sentence using it in context_



_Finally, write a paragraph using the whole list. Of course, you can go a bit over a paragraph if necessary._

.

.

 _Theodosia preferred_ aerobic _exercise like running rather than anaerobic exercise like weight-lifting, since it helped her lose weight faster._

 _Theodosia hasn’t eaten enough for_ oxidative phosphorylation _to occur and keep her energized._

 _Theodosia was horrified to find that her_ metabolism _had slowed during her fasting, and would remain so as she started eating more._

Endorphins _from exercise aren’t addictive, and just give a rush of happiness like “runner’s high”- though Maria disagrees._

.

Theodosia had always thought that health was important, and she was always trying new health fads and diets. She’d taken diets that would make her thinner; such as the always popular high _carbohydrate_ diet, the caveman diet, and the juice cleanse diet. After her disastrous high _glycogen_ diet-- which had promised to guarantee rapid muscle tone-- she decided to go to her friend Maria for help. 

Maria told her that it didn’t matter what diet it was. The only thing mattered was that she got enough nutrients for her specific _metabolism_ to function and didn’t live a _sedentary_ lifestyle. Theodosia decided that Maria made good points and that she would start with getting some exercise. 

First, she decided to get an _exercise stress test_ in order to find out her _endurance_ ; giving her a good idea of what _intensity_ of exercise she ought to start her quest with. When the results got back, she found that she had a naturally low _basal metabolic rate_ and a low _oxygen uptake_ ; giving her good _endurance_ that would be best for aerobic exercise. So Theodosia took up running, and she soon found that she enjoyed it immensely. After each run, she was flooded with _endorphins_ and enjoyed the “runner’s high.” She had a well exercised _circulatory_ system, and her _musculoskeletal_ system was better than ever because of increased amounts of _myoglobin_. 

Theodosia’s _body composition_ now had more muscles and was far healthier. She joked to Maria that it had nothing to do with her new lifestyle, and more to do with the old high- _glycogen_ diet that she’d left behind years ago.

.

 _melanoma_ \- a tumor of high malignancy that starts in melanocytes of normal skin or moles and metastasizes rapidly and widely

.

Alexander stormed down the street, clutching his coffee in righteous anger. Eliza just called him to her place at 2:00 am in the morning because she felt “sad” and similar calls had been going on all week. Despite already being awake at the time, it was still a hassle and Alex would make sure Eliza knew it before giving any comfort. Arriving at the apartment he noticed that the fridge had been left open, likely from when Eliza took out the supply of Ben and Jerry’s. 

“That bad?” he asked as he walked into Eliza’s room.

Eliza wailed in response, “Maria dumped me!!! WHY?! It’s not like the beauty mark on my face became a fist-sized _melanoma!_ She said, ‘Elizabeth, I don’t think this has been working out. Your friend group is insane- and I don’t care if they’re like family to you because I’m selfish and only think of myself- and I really need to support Theodosia more than ever. You know she has trouble sticking to her iron supplements. That’s years of _anemia_ that I need to help undo. Blablabla _hemoglobin_ is so low for her blablabla she’s so much better than you blabla. I was probably cheating on her with you.’”

“She didn’t say that,” Alex matter-of-factly said before sitting down next to her, “But she really broke your heart didn’t she?”

“She did! Both of those things,” Eliza said solemnly, before gasping and choking on more tears, “Does that mean I have a _cardiovascular_ problem now?!”

“It’s an idiom. Ie. it’s metaphorical and your heart is fine.”

“Oh, okay. But. Like. I feel like I took a _neurotoxin_ you know? I can’t stop thinking about it all and my heart hurts so bad,” at that, Eliza took out her phone and searched up for a neurotoxin to diagnose herself with, “Look! Te-trach-lor-oeth-yl-ene!”

“That’s _carcinogenic_. Do you have cancer?”

“I guess not. But- you know it’s just that I would feel better about being so dramatic about it if there was a solid cause. I just feel stupid that I’m still so hung over it.”

Finally reaching the cause of Eliza’s discomfort, Alex quickly assured Eliza that her reaction was controlled and reasonable and left. Though he would’ve liked to stay, he had to get his blood pressure checked since his _hypertension_ was causing him a lot of grief recently. Alexander knew that it was mostly caused by not dealing with his _sleep apnea_ and drinking so much coffee, but he couldn’t help but think it was largely caused by Eliza’s crazy “family.”

.

It started simply enough: Eliza was tired of Alex being a “pathetic hermit” and tried to pair him up with John. Little did Eliza know, but Alex and John had already tried a relationship back when they were in a support group for people with blood issues. John was in for his _hyperglycemia_ and _atherosclerosis_ (which were both caused by his _diabetes_ ), as well as his _peripheral neuropathy_. Alex was in for hypertension and they had quickly bonded over the fact that Alex’s high blood pressure gave them both an equally high risk for _arteriosclerosis_. In the end though, they broke up over John’s volatile lifestyle. They did try to pretend they were together for the first time though (just for the sake of Eliza’s precious heart), and were able to manage around five days. 

Such a failure would never deter someone like Eliza, and in a day Alex was sent on a date with Lafayette-- a then employed and now unemployed emergency surgeon who Alex could ask for advice about anything relating to _epidemiology_. Epidemiology was something that Alex was always paranoid about since his mother died of sickness when he was 12. Unfortunately, or fortunately, Lafayette didn’t find him or his questions charming and they broke up a day after they met. Coincidently, a year later Lafayette married Eliza’s sister Peggy-- who was also presumably set up. 

There was one issue in the relationship though. After a good few months of trying, the newlyweds remembered that Lafayette couldn’t have children. This was because Lafayette found Alex so ingratiating that he got a _vasectomy_ after their breakup, declaring that he would never date again. Obviously Alexander could never be impregnated by Lafayette, but Alex supposed that it was more a matter of principle than of reason. Lafayette’s sterilization was, in fact, not the issue however. Since Lafayette had good relations in the city’s hospital and both he and Peggy came from very wealthy families, the operation to reverse the vasectomy came and went without a hitch. 

The actual issue was the newborn’s death that came about seven months later-- due to the Pulmonary Interstitial _Emphysema_ (PIE). This was most likely caused by the baby’s _predisposition_ towards _respiration_ problems and the family’s vacation in the woods. Alex suspected that in reference to the _pathology_ of PIE, the cabin’s mold and heating problem led to the pneumonia that everyone-- including the premature baby-- got. 

The next babies were born in a hospital and only got _chronic bronchitis_ due to Lafayette’s smoking habit-- which he had picked up as a coping mechanism after his first born’s death. One of the kids, Anastasie, developed chronic _obesity_ because she would often stay home and cough sadly instead of going out because of her bronchitis. In truth, Lafayette’s smoking made the family as a whole quite unhealthy-- making the _prognosis_ for them very grim. Thus, Alex had to set up an intervention; it was a success, though Lafayette’s third kid still had _asthma_ and the others still had bronchitis.

Lafayette still couldn’t get picked up by any other hospitals and with cigarettes banned, soon he became dependent on French wine. That then led to the cirrhosis of his liver, which caused him some _osteoporosis_ , which in turn led to the unprecedented friendship between John and Lafayette; Lafayette’s bone disease and his _hypoglycemia_ matched John’s neuropathy and _hyperglycemia_ soon led to a fast friendship between the two men. However, in the end they ended up unfriending each other on facebook (and presumably in person) after John said that his neuropathy was worse than Lafayette’s bones because the condition was defined by pain.

.

Alex shook his head, his hypertension was definitely caused primarily by Eliza’s friends.

.

 _Coffee is what Alex uses to block her_ neurotransmitters _for sleep, while Lafayette prefers alcohol to block his difficult past._

 _All of Lafayette’s living children have_ congenital _respiratory problems, as diagnosed at birth._

 _Lafayette thinks that his enemies have a far too high_ oxygen uptake _, though in reality, his respiratory ailment indicates that he simply has too low of one. _

_After the cigarette ban, Lafayette turned to French wine, resulting in the_ cirrhosis _of his liver- giving him both bone disease and jaundice._

 _Peggy’s_ endurance _in exercise is like her willpower in life: weak._

 _Due to John’s_ neuropathy _in his leg, he felt constant pain and had to use a cane, making it difficult to continue as a boxer._


	2. Exercise and Nutrition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alex accompanies Eliza in her scheme to win back Maria's heart.

For a minute, Eliza thought that she actually got to date Maria again, until she realized it was just a _hallucination_ , on account of the talking sheep.

After 11 days with no sleep, Alex’s _neuromuscular_ system was out of whack, and was known for running into objects and standing dazed as he pondered what just occurred.

Coffee is what Alex uses to block his _neurotransmitters_ for sleep, while Lafayette prefers alcohol to block his difficult past.

John was prescribed Oxycontin, and soon developed a _physical dependence_ for the drug, taking it every 8 hours for his peripheral neuropathy.

Theodosia preferred aerobic exercise like running rather than _anaerobic_ exercise like weight-lifting, since it helped her lose weight faster.

.

_electrocardiogram (ECG_ ) - a common test that records the electrical signals in your heart; used to detect heart problems and monitor the heart's status in many situations

.

The door closed with a depressing finality, causing Alex to shudder. Sometimes he wondered what cruel god made Eliza so damn persuasive. It seemed all too easy when he agreed. Alexander had to get an _electrocardiogram_ for his hypertension at the hospital anyway, so he would get in, watch Eliza run on a treadmill for a bit, get out, and drink some more coffee. Maybe get in some _carbohydrates_ from the vending machine too. Apparently those would actually give him energy since his body was running low on _glycogen_ . Coffee was still superior though; it was filled with _calories_ , blocked out all those pesky _neurotransmitters_ , and made sure that Alex’s brain couldn’t signal to him how all his life choices were crumbling and slowly ruining him.

And as the nurse kept fiddling with the electrodes on Eliza, he could already feel the caffeine kicking in. The nurse put him on edge, but it was probably due to her excessively thin appearance and the medical surroundings. It was too close of a reminder of his mom. 

The nurse turned to Eliza and snapped Alex out of his reverie, “Are you ready for your _exercise stress test_ m’am?”

Alex whispered to Eliza, “You sure that you want to do this?”

The nurse took this as insecurity, rather than stupidity, on Eliza’s part, “Oh you two don’t have anything to worry about! Just a little _aerobic_ exercise! Though if you’re better at weight-lifting you’re out of luck.”

Eliza laughed and replied with, “Ignore Alex, he’s paranoid. I’m totally ready for this _anaerobic_ exercise!”

Alex failed to resist his oncoming cringe as Eliza unsubtly whispers to him, “When Maria sees my test results, she’ll realize how much she’s broken my heart and my _circulatory_ system! And then she’ll come crying back to me. I can already feel the happy _endorphins_ flooding into my body.”

Just as Alex was going to face palm and defenestrate himself from the nearest window, the nurse piped up, “Alright, just hop on the treadmill and your friend can grab a chair off to the side.”

.

_oxidative phosphorylation - the synthesis of ATP by phosphorylation of ADP for which energy is obtained by electron transport and which takes place in the mitochondria during aerobic respiration_

_myoglobin_ \- a red protein (structurally similar to hemoglobin) containing heme that carries and stores oxygen in muscle cells

.

After about three minutes of running, Eliza got impatient with her master plan. She promptly fell to the floor crying, “My hip! My spleen! My _myoglobin_ ! I can’t breathe! The hypoxia !! I can feel my _musculoskeletal_ system collapsing beneath me! I’m in pain! All 32 of my ribs have snapped and shattered! My _neuromuscular_ system has failed me! Oh no! I can and can’t feel the pain in my muscles! Each cell in my body has reversed the direction of _oxidative phosphorylation_! I’m draining energy!”

The nurse just blinked slowly, “Are you feeling alright?”

“NOT ANYMORE! NOT AFTER WHAT HAPPENED!”

Apparently, she was already done with Eliza’s shenanigans and simply responded, “Your _oxygen uptake_ seemed to be perfectly fine for someone your age. No _cardiorespiratory/cardiopulmonary_ problems, really. Honestly, it isn’t the best test since it only lasted for about three minutes and your vitals were normal up until then. Your _endurance_ and the _intensity_ of your previous exercise does come into question. A lot. Um. I commend your dedication to getting yourself tested though-- absolutely important.”

As Eliza ran out of the room, Alex shook the lady’s wiry hand, “Yeah, so thanks for doing that. She’s been… emotional lately.”

“No problem, anytime-- I mean I get paid for doing this anyway.”

“Cool, so you handled that relatively well. That’s good. So. I’m pretty sure that she’ll think of another scheme in about a week or so. It would be really convenient if we could just go to you next time. Um. Not saying you have to or anything but I have some rich friends-- one of them probably knows your boss-- so I’d definitely be able to threaten your livelihood--”

“It’s fine-- I have nothing better to do. Just ask for Resident Nurse Burr next time you come in. You can call me Theodosia.”

.

When John dealt his Oxycontin for money, the druggies would smoke it and experience intense _euphoria_ , making them very content.

As Peggy wanted to have six children, and she had to sell her emerald earrings for enough money to reverse the her husband's _vasectomy_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I said I would upload each week? Then the coronavirus happened and I honestly don't really know what happened. So oops. Kinda funny considering that actually all of this is prewritten by freshman-me, but somehow I can't be bothered to upload it regularly. Oh whelp.


	3. Addiction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An intervention is held and Alex goes AWOL

Even after Peggy’s husband stopped smoking after Alex held an intervention, her third child still had _asthma_ due to years of exposure.

On an especially annoying day, Alex can consider Eliza to be a _parasite_ living off of Alex’s good will.

.

He took two shots of black coffee mixed with red bull and five-hour energy: one to stop the sleep that was blinking into his vision and one to remain calm (something vaguely ironic for a  _ stimulant _ ), and a finale of whiskey for courage. Eliza called, but Alex was hoping the message she left was just a  _ hallucination _ . It almost hurt to think that after all he’d done for Eliza, the woman still clung to her delusional ways, wanting to hold not just another intervention, but another one for Lafayette. Clearly he was a lost cause, but Eliza was always in denial. 

The world was cruel and unusual.

He slowly picked up the phone and called Eliza back. He didn’t even have a chance to say his prayers- Eliza’s chipper tone cutting through the first ring. Answering quickly was common enough, but with recent events it was quite suspicious, almost unmistakeable of his friend returning to bad habits. But it wasn’t his business whether or not Eliza was taking something to get a taste of  _ bliss _ .

“Hey.”

“Oh my god! You called back, I thought that you abandoned me!”

“Wow. I would never.”

“Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo… Will you do it?”

Alex pinched the bridge of his nose, “Only if you don’t show up to the intervention on whatever you’re on now.”

She could almost see her sniffle and wipe away a tear, “Awwww. How could you tell?”

“By your generally unsubtle quality. So get all of Lafayette’s friends and family to his house before he’s out of work. We’ll talk it out. Lafayette will pretend to listen and in two weeks time he’ll be doing meth. Or whatever god-awful  _ pharmaceutical _ drug he can get his grubby hands on at the hospital. ”

“So little faith, sir, so little faith.”

With that, Alex hung up. He grabbed some  _ hypnotics _ and  _ narcotics _ ; he wanted to take a three day nap after this, and while one or the other would help, he couldn’t take anymore chances.

.

Apparently stupidity isn’t a disease, let alone a  _ communicable disease _ , but standing in the same room as John made Alex believe otherwise.

Lafayette knows that alcohol is a  _ depressant _ , but he personally feels much happier and alert after two bottles of good sherry.

.

It was odd how history seemed to repeat itself; the intervention was just like Blood Issues Anonymous. John sat in the corner, aloof as always. A sniffly woman-- in this case Peggy-- would be either on the verge or already in a sea of tears. Eliza would have to be the stand-in for the lonely one though, mostly because Alex refused to accept the title in his own monologue. None of the kids were there though; he planned to use their bargaining power later if this went as poorly as she suspected.

Finally the man of the hour, or maybe the man of the three minutes if he was lucky, arrived. Looking at him, it seemed that Alex wasn’t the only one at the intervention who was taking something to get through it.

“Hi Lafayetttttee!! You want to talk about your  _ physical dependence _ on alcohol???”

Straight to the point, but then again always Eliza stepped into Lafayette's eye-twitching territory. It was always dangerous and almost always resulted in scalpel injuries. Regardless, Lafayette carefully sits down next to Peggy, who cocoons herself around him. Maybe that would give some help with the whole “rebirth” deal.

“Hey man, we care about you,” John started.

“John, why are you here? I thought I told security to never let you in this house again.”

“A text message isn’t as good as an actual restraining order.”

In a desperate bid to prevent the inevitable doom of the interaction between the two exes, the group began spewing their poorly rehearsed get-help messages to get the intervention back on track.

“We know that life has been hard, but you don’t have to do this.”

“Do you want to die of  _ cirrhosis _ when you’re in your forties? Because I can tell you that’s exactly what’s going to happen. Livers are important!”

“You’ve gone through a  _ withdrawal _ before, how bad can it be?”

“Think of the kids Lafayette, Katie wouldn’t want this...”

“It’s a  depressant Lafayette! It literally makes you an even sadder husk of a human being. It’s  _ psychoactive _ and it’s changing you. You aren’t the man I married.”

“You can’t drink away your problems forever. Despite what your  _psychological_ _dependence_ says to your brain, your problems still exist while you’re drunk out of your mind.”

“Your  _ tolerance _ for alcohol might be high, but mine for you isn’t!”

“You don’t need alcohol, it’s just an add--” 

Lafayette was finally done with the discussion, and began bellowing loudly into the ceiling. “IT’S NOT AN  _ ADDICTION _ . I DON’T CARE WHAT YOU THINK YOU CAN SAY TO CHANGE MY MIND, BUT IT’S-- IT’S NOT HAPPENING. MAYBE I DO THIS BECAUSE I CAN CONTROL MY OWN LIFE WITHOUT YOU ALWAYS TRYING TO DO IT FOR ME. MAYBE WHEN I DO IT, I GET A LITTLE BIT OF  _ EUPHORIA _ . I CAN FORGET ALL OF THIS WHEN I’M DRUNK,” he said, gesturing vaguely, “I DRINK TO FORGET. TO FORGET ABOUT MY PROBLEMS. TO FORGET ABOUT YOU, AND YOUR ENDLESS NAGGING.”

Peggy started, “Woah woah woah, calm down--”

“Because maybe I just want to forget you.”

.

After the first three days without cigarettes, the doctor was experiencing  _ withdrawal _ , and would angrily throw his scalpel at anyone who annoyed him.

.

It actually went better than expected. That wasn’t saying much, but optimism usually brings poor results, and Alex was impressed. They would need to redo the windows, but John seemed to be doing well enough in talking Lafayette down. After the kids were sent to bed, everyone agreed to go home and continue the next day.

Alex actually felt content. Maybe it was those  _ sedatives _ he just downed, but he felt it went well. He snuggled into bed, and fell into a deep sleep.

.

Alex didn’t think his dependence on coffee was an  _ addiction _ since it was legal.

_._

_designer drug_ \- a synthetic version of a controlled substance (such as heroin); produced with slightly altered molecular structure to avoid classification as an illicit drug

.

(3 missed messages from Eliza Schuyler)

“Hey? Hello? For the love of all things Alex, the one night you actually sleep?! God why? Um. You know it’s kind of funny actually. Seriously, um. I took some Oxycontin. It’s like an  _ opiate _ from some high-schooler, who got it from someone else and so on. You know, to numb out the pain of being replaced by that fake  _ designer drug _ of a bitch Theodo-- not the point. The point is that the trail of my Oxycontin led back to John! I know like CRAZY right?!? Oh shoot this is a message hold on--”

“--so yeah. Turns out he’s trying to earn some money for himself, lying about that whole ‘stable job thing.’ Anyway, his whole ‘comforting Lafayette’ deal was actually him convincing Lafayette to take a hit of his stock. The... the issue is that he didn’t know that the opiate actually has a really bad reaction with alcohol, which GUESS WHAT? Is exactly what Lafayette had drank not even 30 minutes earlier--”

“--so we’re at the hospital right now. COME ON. THIS IS IMPORTANT STUFF ALEX. HE COULD DIE TONIGHT. I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU’RE SLEEPING. You better be sleeping. Wait. Hold on, does anyone have a charger for a--”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm just spamming these chapters but it's okay because nobody is reading this fic :D


	4. Chapter 4

The  incidence was growing with each _incident_ and instance.

Sometimes, a yawn can spread like an _epidemic_ ; there’s one, and soon there’s a hundred.

.

“I swear Jenkins, that’s the third case this week. With this kind of  _ incidence _ rate we might have a  _ pandemic _ on our hands!”

“Ha! Good thing the  prevalence will decrease with the increase of the death count.”

“You were always clever at  epidemiology Jenkins, but not so loud around the patients!”

John cringed away from the surprisingly thin walls, and decided to distract himself by staring Lafayette down from across the room. Unlike him, Eliza and Peggy were draping themselves dramatically over Lafayette’s comatose body, the former saying something about how they would get through it. John may have been dumb enough to cause the entire situation, but he was smart enough to heed the doctor’s  _ prognosis _ , which went along the lines of “never waking up again.” Without Alex to knock common sense into them and get them to fill out their paperwork, they had resigned themselves to the melodrama of urging Lafayette to get up. John usually would have punched them, but he had caused enough problems already.

John sighed.

He dropped out of high school and jumped two states to leave his dad, so he knew when he clearly wasn’t needed. Maybe some fresh air could sidetrack him from the guilt of basically murdering his pseudo-friend.

He ducked around some doctors. Down the hall some nurses were washing their hands and prattling about how cute their patient was. He briefly reflected on the irony that a hospital was the best place for a  _ communicable disease _ ; there were plenty of  _ contagious _ and weakened patients for an  _ epidemic _ to spread. Tens of hundreds of doctors must be fishing out their gloves out of the same box.

The receptionist called for a sad looking mother to see her daughter. John returned to his musings. It could be any  _ microorganism _ really. They stick the IVs straight into the skin, and some curious  _ bacterium _ would worm their way straight to the heart. If the patient didn’t die immediately- which they wouldn’t because the world was often cruel- they would get  sepsis . No one would want to pull the plug, and they would die slowly and painfully.

The lobby was relatively empty; maybe it was a quiet night. The only time a room was that empty was at his mom’s funeral.

Funerals reminded him of Lafayette’s clear and imminent death.

John realized he would have to save Lafayette. It would be hard, but John was sure that Lafayette was only moments away from death. John had been both a pretty intense and an intensely petty friend to Lafayette, but he would make it right.

.

Since  _ bacteria _ live everywhere, they are likely to get into an IV tube and kill a patient.

.

_virulent_ \- dangerous and spreading quickly

.

Eliza supportively patted her sister on the back.

“Peggy, I’m going to fill out the paperwork for Lafayette.”

Peggy started hysterically crying again, so Eliza took that as her cue to leave, “Remember everything’s going to be fine. He’s beaten the odds before! I’m going to be just down the hall alright?”

“HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN-”

Eliza quickly closed the door and gave a sigh of relief. Sometimes it got too hard. The only benefit would be if Alex was here. Alex would judge her regardless of whether she was too happy or too sad or too eccentric, and that was something she missed. Maybe Alex finally got tired of Eliza. Eliza thought that was a definite possibility. 

Since thinking wasn’t a frequent hobby of hers, her lack of focus caused her to bump into a frail woman walking down the hall.

Looking up, Eliza made three realizations: 

  1. This woman was the nurse Alex had been bringing her to. 
  2. The nurse always went without her name-tag during their visits. 
  3. The name-tag proclaimed the nurse’s name as Theodosia Burr.



In that moment, she realized Alex had been setting her up the whole time.

For whatever reason, Alex had crafted a situation where Eliza made a fool of herself trying to win Maria back in front of Maria’s new girlfriend. Eliza felt like a  _ prion _ had infected her, and her usually unusually stupid brain had become spongy and somehow even more stupid. Eliza wondered how she hadn’t died of some infection before, since she clearly wasn’t good at identifying friends, and her  _ antibodies _ must be even worse. Or maybe her brain was smaller than a complex molecule. 

“Hey Maria, can you help me out? She’s just staring at me.”

She cursed Alex for being a  _ parasite _ who lived off of others’ suffering, but also admitted that it wasn’t entirely his fault that Eliza was a massive idiot who was so easy to take advantage of. She only wished that she could have taken all her parasitic  _ vaccines _ to prevent all of this suffering from even happening.

Maria looked at Eliza and laughed, “Hi Eliza! Don’t tell me you’ve been stalking me.”

“WHAT NO! Um. Actually I’m here with my friend Lafayette. He’s. Uh. In a coma.”

“Oh.”

“Too much information?”

“Kind of,” Maria smiled.

“Yeah,” Eliza sniffled, “So I’m going to leave before this gets anymore awkward.”

“You don’t want to stay?”

“Hallway congestion. It’s a  _ virulent _ disease that’s very worrying in a hospital setting.”

Maria frowned, “Hey Eliza, I’m sorry. Did I do something wrong?”

Eliza paused and considered. She considered calling Maria out in the middle of the hallway. She considered begging her to come back. Eliza had thought that Maria was the single light in her life. If it weren’t for all that had in the past few weeks, maybe she would still think so.

Instead she smiled and said, “No. I just have some paperwork to fill out. You know, coma and all that.” And as she walked away, “Maybe we can have coffee together sometime.”

.

Lafayette thought that alcohol was an  antibiotic and his problems were bacteria- but clearly they were a resistant type.

.

.

“You know Lafayette, I wasn’t sure when Eliza first got us to get together. I’m still not sure. You’re a dolt; a huge idiot. You make irate and illogical choices. You’re a doctor and you smoke. You’re a doctor and you drink. You’re a doctor and you take drugs. From John of all people. 

What would the kids think? I don’t even know. I’m not sure what a genius like you would guess.

I hope you know this is a lot of money. I’m not saying you should wake up just because of the money, because clearly you didn’t care about me or the kids enough to not do something like this in the first place, but you should know. So you can feel guilty about it. About doing all of this” 

Peggy sniffed wetly, “And you know the sad thing? I wouldn’t mind at all as long as you apologized.”

Suddenly she felt something-- or someone-- stir below her.

“Sorry.”

.

And Alex finally got to sleep peacefully.

.

People may claim that love was _contagious_ but Alex figures that if everyone is supposed to love each other anyway its ability to spread would be irrelevant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end is actually supposed to be somewhat negative, but mostly for my own personal amusement. Like Lafayette waking up is supposed to be bad since he's kind of a bad person and will probably just hurt his family/Peggy. It also hints that Alex died, since he was mixing drugs earlier on. Which would then be bad since it's sorta supposed to be that Alex was what was keeping the group together and with all of their issues ultimately unresolved it would lead to /bad things/. Hahaha good times. 
> 
> Anyway thanks for reading :)

**Author's Note:**

> Don't hate me for writing this?


End file.
